This blog will chronicle my comments and other critical articles, cartoons and videos. Time has come for us to put America first and Party 2nd. This page will have the good, bad and ugly of Republicans, Democrats and Libertarians alike, but will always offer pluralistic solutions effective June 8, 2014

Friday, December 9, 2016

At this point in history, we are going through difficult times. Whether you are on the right, left or the center, you are concerned about the liberties and freedoms of all Americans. The divisiveness, even though temporary, has caused us to lose trust in each other to function effectively as a nation.

So what can we do?

Our President John Kennedy had famously urged us, “Ask not what the country can do - ask what you can do for your country.” and Professor William James had written that our actions can change the moods.

Here is what we can to do to restore America where no Americans feels left out, but feels included in nation building.

Let’s close 2016 on a positive note, let’s come together as Americans, and celebrate our collective Festivals of Hanukkah, Christmas, Milad, Kwanza, Janamashtami, Gurpurab and the festivities of Native Americans, and other traditions including Atheist/Humanist. Each group will get to sing honoring their faith tradition.

When we are together, it is uplifting!We can change our moods!

The following video has clips from Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanza, Milad, Janamashtami and other great celebrations. On the actual day of Festival of Faiths, Americans Together will celebrate their traditions.

Dr. Mike Ghouse is founder and president of Center for Pluralism aka Americans Together. He is committed to building cohesive societies and offers pluralistic solutions on issues of the day. All about him in 65 links at www.MikeGhouse.net

Monday, June 27, 2016

Here is why I quit in October 2014:

Columnist George Will Leaves GOP over Donald Trump

JUNE 27, 2016

HEADLINES

The leading conservative columnist and commentator George Will has left the Republican Party over the presumed nomination of Donald Trump. Speaking on Fox News Sunday, Will said he had changed his voter registration in Maryland to "unaffiliated" 23 days ago.

George Will: "Shortly after Trump became the presumptive nominee, he had a summit meeting with Paul Ryan, where they stressed their common principles and their vast shared ground, which is much more important than their differences. I thought that was puzzling, doubly so because Paul Ryan still didn’t endorse him. After Trump went after the Mexican judge from northern Indiana, then Paul Ryan endorsed him. And I decided that, in fact, this is not my party anymore."

Tuesday, June 21, 2016

One of the best articles written about debunking some of the Republican hatred for Blacks and women.

Mike Ghouse# # #

June 21, 2016 by Mindy Fischer

Three of the main attacks on Hillary are that she’s dishonest and untrustworthy, she is involved in too many scandals, and she has ties to big money and Wall Street. So let’s take a look at all three….

Hillary Clinton is being held to a higher standard than any of her male counterparts. That is a fact. But why is that? Is it because she’s a woman? I don’t know, but considering how often she is attacked for doing nothing more….and in many cases far less….than any man that’s run for President, it’s hard to imagine that sexism doesn’t play at least a part in the Hillary-hating.

It’s a little reminiscent of the way Republicans have treated President Obama. They have shown more disrespect and outright hatred for Obama than any President in history. And it’s just as hard to imagine that racism doesn’t play a part.

But of the many attacks constantly thrown at Hillary, there seem to be three that consistently come up….dishonesty, scandals, and her ties to big money and Wall Street. But are those attacks….many times border-lining on slander….warranted?

Well let’s break these attacks down and shine a little reality into the situation.

Hillary Clinton is a liar! I don’t trust her!

First of all, let me state the obvious right up front. Hillary is human. And yes, she has made mistakes. Please show me a politician who’s never told a lie or exaggerated or embellished….you can’t….because there are none. But in most cases where she is accused of lying, people are just repeating something they’ve heard countless times. Whether or not she has actually lied about whatever issue doesn’t matter to Hillary-haters. They’ve successfully stoked the narrative that she’s not honest.

It doesn’t matter to the haters that many of the things she’s been accused of lying about are simply her evolving her positions over the years. Obama and any politician who’s been around more than 5 minutes has done the same. But it’s only Hillary that gets bombarded with the liar label. Because, well….Hillary.

But is Hillary a bigger liar than Trump, or any other politician for that matter? No. In fact, according to PolitiFact Hillary Clinton is actually the most honest of any candidate that has run for President this cycle.PolitiFact has rated 24% of her contentious statements as perfectly “true.” While that may seem low, compare that to Bernie Sanders….who no one has ever called a liar….who rated at just 15% for perfectly true statements.

If you add up Hillary’s comments that scored “true,” “mostly true,” or “half true” she scores 72%. Bernie scores 70%. Only 14% of Hillary’s statements rated as “false” or “pants on fire.” By the same measure, Bernie scored 15%.

But if you really want to look at a good comparison, you have to look at Trump’s scores. Trump only gets the “true” rating 2% of the time. And when you add his “false” and “pants on fire” statements he scores a whopping 61%, which makes him the biggest liar of any politician PolitiFact has ever scored. And yet when Trump is literally lying 61% of the time….compared to Hillary’s 14%…..he is somehow still seen as being more honest than Hillary. Ironically every time Trump carries on about Hillary’s lies, it is actually Trump who’s lying.

Hillary is guilty of all sorts of scandals!

It’s interesting that Hillary-haters just automatically assume that she’s guilty because there have been scandals surrounding her. The truth is another thing entirely. Has Hillary had her share of scandals? Yes. But just because she has been accused of something or implicated in a scandal does not make her guilty. As a matter of fact, in every case she has been cleared of any wrongdoing. Funny how Repubs never mention that part.

Every time she is implicated in some new scandal, Republicans just continue to pound the “she’s untrustworthy” drum. And that’s the whole point. They know that every time they can attach her to a scandal they can feed their narrative.

The Republicans have spent more time and money investigating Hillary than any other politician in history. They once literally spent 10 days and 140 hours to investigate her use of the White House Christmas card list. Seriously.

Just look at how they’ve handled her “email scandal.” This is just another example of how Hillary is being held to a standard that no one else is being held to.

Hillary has been accused of using a personal email server that could have made classified documents less secure. (Never mind that the classified documents in question weren’t labeled classified until AFTER she sent or received them.) But, once again, after wasting time and money, the Republicans have found no basis for any criminal charges.

Compare the way Hillary is being treated about this whole email thing to the General David Petraeus scandal. Petraeus was the Director of the CIA when he purposefully gave his mistress classified documents revealing the identities of covert officers, war strategy, intelligence capabilities, information from high level National Security Council meetings, and conversations that Petraeus has with the President. And if that weren’t bad enough Petraeus then lied about it to government officials and the FBI. There is no question about any of this. Petraeus eventually confessed to the whole thing.

Clearly what Patraeus did was far worse than anything Hillary has been accused of. Yet it is Hillary, not Petraeus who the Republicans want in jail. To this day Petraeus is a beloved figure to righties and the Republicans would bring him back to the White House in a heartbeat if Trump won. Double standard? Yep…just like with most attacks on Hillary.

Hillary is tied to big money and Wall Street!

Hillary has made a lot of money from speaking engagements, that is true. But she hardly invented big paying speeches. It is not uncommon for former politicians, or celebrities, or sports stars, or business tycoons to receive huge speaking fees. Paris Hilton has been paid $750,000 just to show up at events, for example.

After 9/11 Rudy Giuliani was making around $700,000 a month on speaking fees, with an average of about $270,000 per speech. It’s estimated that Giuliani made about $40 Million over the 5 years before he ran for President in 2007. But was he demonized for that? No. Did anyone question the fees or his loyalties? No. Clinton, on the other hand, has been scrutinized endlessly about this.

Now, there certainly is a discussion worth having about how much money is in politics. But pinning the entire game on Hillary is ridiculous.

As for Wall Street, the vast majority of Hillary’s money has actually NOT come from Wall Street. Since leaving her job as Secretary of State, Hillary has made approximately 100 speeches. Of those 100, only 8 of them were to Wall Street banks. The rest of her speeches were given to organizations like the American Camping Association, Ebay, Cisco, Xerox, the Cardiovascular Research Foundation, A&E Television Networks, the Massachusetts Conference for Women, the U.S. Green Building Council, and the Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries….just to name a few.

All but one of Hillary’s 8 speeches to Wall Street paid her $225,000. While that is a lot of money, it wasn’t close to the most she was being paid to speak.

So do her speaking fees mean that she is suddenly beholden to the group who paid her? Hardly. And once again why is Hillary the only one questioned about this? Is she influenced by Wall Street? Yes. But please show me one politician or business, or person for that matter who is not affected by Wall Street. Wall Street drives our economy. How could we not be influenced by them? But influence does not equal guilty of corruption. This should not be a case of guilt by association.

And just for another basis of comparison, Trump has been paid $1.5 Million several times for speeches. So where’s the outrage about that? Oh, right….there is none….he’s a Republican. And a man.

Hillary is definitely not a perfect candidate. And yes, there are going to be times that she disappoints. She is an imperfect human….like we all are. But one thing that is for sure is that she is the most qualified candidate to ever run for the office. I’d hold up her resume to those on the Republican side any day of the week….and twice on Sundays.

And for all of the attacks that have been launched at her over the years, she has always come out standing strong. She is battle tested, sharp, and able to withstand endless unwarranted attacks. The attacks certainly feed into the Republican narrative about her, but very little is based in reality.

Search is on for a third-party candidate to take down Trump

Conservative activists who want a third-party alternative to Donald Trump and Hillary Clintonface one big obstacle: finding the right candidate.

Former Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) would be a unifying figure for conservatives, but his health is in question after a battle with cancer.

Sen. Ben Sasse (R-Neb.), who helped kick off the push for a third-party pro-Constitution candidate in February, has taken himself out of the running, citing obligations to his family.

“The answer is no. Senator Sasse has been clear when asked this before: he has three little kids and the only callings he wants — raising them and serving Nebraskans,” said his spokesman James Wegmann.

The names of Former Texas Gov. Rick Perry (R-Texas) and former Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal (R-La.) had both been mentioned, but they removed themselves from consideration by announcing they will support Trump.

Two other potential candidates — Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, the 2012 Republican nominee, and former New Mexico Gov. Gary Johnson, who is expected to win the Libertarian Party’s nomination for president later this year — are non-starters with the conservatives who are involved in discussions about a third-party candidate.

Erick Erickson, the conservative writer and radio host who has organized conference calls about a Trump alternative, said the movement wants a new face, which is not Romney.

“His name has been floated by three separate groups and all of them came to the conclusion that a new face was needed,” he said.

“Given the antipathy for Trump and Hillary [Clinton], you could put together a compelling ticket that would unite conservatives and the more establishment Republicans and probably pick up some independents along the way,” he said.

Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) rocked Republican circles on Thursday afternoon when he announced he will not back Trump, at least for now, giving conservatives valuable time to field another option.

Romney and former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush (R) and Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), who both ran against for president, said this week there’s no chance they will vote for Trump, adding to the growing chorus of holdouts within the party establishment.

Romney allies interviewed by The Hill said they are frustrated by the choices before them, but aren’t pushing for him to enter the race.

They believe a third-party or independent bid would be a near impossible for anyone to pull off, and don’t want to see Romney drained of all his political capital over a doomed effort in which he might be blamed for handing the election over to Clinton.

“I don’t want to see him get in unless there was a chance he could win,” one former Romney adviser said. “There’s enormous dissatisfaction with both major party candidates, but it’s too steep a climb. Is there an opening? Sure. Is it realistic? I don’t think so.”

Other conservatives say Johnson, an early advocate of legalizing marijuana who told The Daily Caller he consumed cannabis within the last several weeks, “is a bridge too far to cross.”

Many establishment Republicans and conservatives view Johnson as a fringe figure.

“He might be an outlet for some protest votes, but if your concern with Donald Trump is that he’s not presidential enough, I’m not sure why Gary Johnson would be your guy,” said Ryan Williams, a veteran of Mitt Romney’s 2012 campaign.

“I don’t think Gary Johnson was discussed more than three seconds,” said Deborah DeMoss Fonseca, a spokeswoman for the conservatives looking for a Trump alternative.

“The question is, ‘What are our options?’ and that is what is still being discussed and that takes hours and hours and hours,” DeMoss Fonseca added. “We’re working with different groups of people that have different expertise.”

Organizers of the third-party, conservative push estimate it will cost at least $250 million to fund a candidate, and possibly tens or hundreds of millions of dollars more.

The other challenge is navigating the complex rules for getting a presidential candidate on the ballot in all 50 states.

The fundraising and ballot requirements are two major reasons why former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who has presidential ambitions and billions of dollars in personal wealth, thought he needed to make a decision about running for the White House by the end of March. He ultimately passed on it.

Conservatives involved in the search for a Trump alternative describe their discussions as decentralized, with various groups holding conference calls and conducting fact-finding missions.

In addition to Erickson and DeMoss Fonseca, other participants include Bill Kristol, editor of the Weekly Standard, Bill Wichterman, a former aide for former Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) who is well-connected among social conservatives, and Bob Fischer, a South Dakota businessman and longtime activist.

They hope that Paul Singer, the billionaire hedge fund manager who helped bankroll the “Never Trump” campaign before Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) dropped out of the presidential race, can be enticed to back a third-party option in the fall. Calls and e-mails to Singer’s office were not returned.

Charles and David Koch, the billionaire industrialists who have funded other conservative causes, are viewed as another potential source of the money. But it will take some cajoling to get them on board.

James Davis, a spokesman for Freedom Partners, the umbrella political group funded by the Kochs, told The Hill that it’s not considering supporting a third-party candidate.

David Koch ran for vice president on the Libertarian Party’s ticket in 1980, which received only 1 percent of the vote.

“There’s a lot of activity between us and a lot of phone calls and emails about who to contact. We’re still reaching out to financial people as well as to people to see if there’s a widespread for a third candidate,” said DeMoss Fonseca. “Six months ago all of us would have said, ‘That’s silly, that’s ridiculous.’

“We want to do something that’s effective and credible,” she added. “For the first time in our lifetimes there are a lot of people and a lot of big Republicans are saying, ‘We can do this but is it too late? Is there still a pathway?’ ”

But other Republican voices in the Never Trump movement are beginning to doubt the viability of a third candidate.

Operatives from the two leading anti-Trump super-PACs did not participate in the recent conference calls.

Katie Packer, a former senior adviser to Mitt Romney who runs the main anti-Trump group, Our Principles PAC, said her group is turning its focus from the presidential race to protecting GOP majorities in the House and the Senate.

“Looking at the data, we’re very worried about incumbent Republicans getting caught up in a flood,” she said. “The first thing we’re looking at is what can be done for down-ballot Republicans. We don’t have any plans to actively oppose Trump in the general election … but we continue to believe he’s terrible for the party, the country, and especially down-ballot Republicans, so we’re looking for opportunities to help them.”

An operative for the Never Trump PAC, a smaller group that has so far focused primarily on digital ad buys, told The Hill they’re also not engaging in the effort to recruit an alternative, but said they might get on board if the right candidate materializes.

Monday, April 11, 2016

The best statement ever made to describe two nuts, one is too fluid and other this frigid - Mike GhousePick your poison, GOP: Both President Trump or President Cruz could frustrate the hell out of Republicans"It’s interesting nonetheless that Republicans could be faced with a choice between one candidate who is too ideologically fluid to trust, and another who is too ideologically rigid to work with." Simon Maloy of Salon.

Thursday, March 31, 2016

If Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump gets the GOP's nomination, he would be the most disliked major-party nominee in modern times, according to a Washington Post-ABC News poll released Thursday.

Trump has a 67 percent unfavorable rating, with just 30 percent favorable.

The businessman is viewed unfavorably by 75 percent of women, 66 percent of independents, 85 percent of Hispanics and 80 percent of young adults.

Nearly half of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents also view him unfavorably.

Just when you thought Donald Trump couldn’t say anything more shocking, he suggested that women who get abortions should be punished.On MSNBC, he said abortion must be banned and then “there has to be some form of punishment” for women who manage to get abortions.He declined to say what the punishment should be, dodging a question about whether it should be “10 years” in prison or something milder. But his comment raised the possibility of following the lead of countries like El Salvador, where women can be dragged off from a hospital to prison for getting an abortion. Indeed, rights groups say that womenwere wrongly imprisoned in El Salvador simply for having miscarriages.Trump doesn’t seem to have thought deeply about the issue — what a surprise! — and he departed from the mainstream anti-abortion position of targeting not women but abortion providers. As one personsaid on Twitter: “He’s a walking cartoon parody of every leftist accusation against Republicans.”After the TV interview was over and the backlash had begun, Trump tried to back off his comment, saying in a statement, “The doctor or any other person performing this illegal act upon a woman would be held legally responsible, not the woman.”Who knows where that leaves us!One lesson is that Trump is an uninformed opportunist, but the episode does highlight two basic problems for the anti-abortion movement.First, as long as the focus is on the fetus or on the claim of “protecting women,” many in the public are sympathetic to the anti-abortion view. The moment the focus shifts to criminalizing women, sympathy shifts.Anti-abortion activists have generally taken a savvy approach over the years by concentrating on extreme situations — such as late-term so-called partial-birth abortions — and on legislating obstacles that in practice reduce access: Of the 1,074 state restrictions on abortion put in place after Roe v. Wade in 1973, more than one-quarter were enacted since 2010, according to the Guttmacher Institute.Many Americans are ambivalent on abortion. But Trump has now turned the attention back from the fetus to the woman. And remember that three in 10 American women get an abortion at some point in their livesSecond, the data suggests that one of the most effective ways to reduce the number of abortions would be to increase the availability of publicly funded family planning. In 2013, publicly funded family planningprevented two million unintended pregnancies, including almost 700,000 abortions, according to the Guttmacher Institute.Yet Republicans try to defund Title X, the traditional family planning program in the United States. After inflation, its funding level is less than one-third what it was in 1980.In truth, Trump’s stance — whatever it is — would matter only if a more conservative Supreme Court revisited Roe v. Wade and some states were allowed to ban abortion altogether.Moreover, medical abortion, achieved by taking two kinds of pills, is gaining ground on surgical abortion and is much more difficult to stop. In particular, one of the pills, misoprostol, is very cheap, has other uses and is at least 80 percent effective on its own in inducing an abortion early in pregnancy. The upshot is that early abortions will be increasingly difficult to prevent.Trump’s comments about punishing women are worth pondering because they reflect the logical conclusion of equating a fetus with any other human being.This penalizing approach has been tried before and failed. A dozen years ago, I went to Portugal to cover such an effort. The police staked out women’s health clinics, looking to arrest women who appeared likely to have just had abortions based on being pale or seeming upset. Some 48 women and a 16-year-old girl were prosecuted, along with accomplices such as husbands, boyfriends, parents and even a taxi driver who drove a woman to a clinic.The women were humiliated on trial, their most intimate gynecological history revealed to the public. And the public was revolted. The women were all acquitted, and the public turned decisively in favor of abortion rights, by a majority of 79 percent to 14 percent.“Forbidding abortion doesn’t save anyone or anything,” Sonia Fertuzinhos, a member of the Portuguese Parliament, told me at the time. “It just gets women arrested and humiliated in the public arena.”The episode left many Portuguese both anti-abortion and pro-choice. They were distressed by abortion, especially late in pregnancies, but they were aghast at the idea of prosecuting young women for making wrenching personal choices. I think many Americans feel the same way.So maybe Trump, in his flip-flopping wavering about women’s issues, can at least remind us of a larger truth. Whatever one thinks of abortion, criminalizing it would be worse.

I invite you to sign up for my free, twice-weekly newsletter. When you do, you’ll receive an email about my columns as they’re published and other occasional commentary. Sign up here.

Tuesday, March 29, 2016

I
hope everyone who has been messed by Trump staffers sue Mr. Trump, as he is the
one who eggs on his staff to be violent, let the courts pile up cases upon
cases, he said he will pay for it, let him, it is not the money, and it is the
fact that his rudeness is established in the court. This
man Trump learns to treat people with respect.

America has always been a great country and Tramp is trashing it with his
attitudes, language and violence. Let
him learn to behave.

Let’s hope Trump’s bad news is good news for
America. Let me write this in bullets;

Michelle’s ugly boss man at Brietbart does not want to press charges against
Trump, everyone should be outraged at this, and because she is woman the
assholes discounted her story. I am glad she pursued.

Monday, March 14, 2016

To put it bluntly, if the goodmen do nothing to stop Trump, they are giving him permission to continue to pit one American against the other. This will be the demise of the Republican party. If the majority of them don't speak up, they are with him, and we the people have to defeat Trump from destroying America.

Stand Up To Trump

The most sacred duty of the President of the United States of America is to defend and protect the Constitution and the principles it enshrines: freedom, fairness, and equality. Donald Trump, a racist and a liar, has become the front runner for the Republican presidential nomination by standing in opposition to these principles.

But it is important to understand that Trump is simply the latest in a long line of authoritarian figures that prey on deeply held fears. Conservative candidates have stoked those fears for decades pitting Americans against one another for electoral gain. If Republican leaders support his candidacy now, they support his values and become part of the problem.

Trump manipulates the fearful by promising that he will use his fraudulent deal-making prowess to protect and take care of his supporters. He is a schoolyard bully promising protection, even as he runs for President of the world’s greatest country on a platform that will worsen the real threats America must face. He preys on America’s prejudices and scapegoats entire races of people, all for the sake of his own ego.

Trump’s vitriol attracts large crowds and may even win him the Republican presidential nomination but dishonors our best traditions. It spits in the face of every protection and opportunity our Constitution promises. We have a moral obligation?—?and a patriotic duty?—?to speak out against this hatred and intimidation and to fight for an America that our children and grandchildren will be proud to call home.

Across the country, Americans of all backgrounds and beliefs are doing just that, standing up to Trump’s hatred. I am proud to stand with them, and I thank them for leading the way. Together, we are proclaiming to the world that Trump is not ours. We will not be silent. We will not stand back and let him put a torch to the ideals and principles that Americans hold dear.

Our country is better than Trump’s rhetoric. We are better than his hatred and better than his racism. And we will embrace the values of freedom, fairness, and equality?—?values that have already made America great.

Tom Steyer is a business leader and philanthropist who has pledged to give most of his wealth to charitable causes.

Dr. Ghouse has appeared in over 200 TV shows and is a frequent guest with Hannity and Varney shows at Fox News along with others. He has over 1000 hours of Radio Shows of which 700 were dedicated to interfaith and pluralism. Over 3000 articles have been published of which a 1000 were on politics, foreign policy, sports and movies, a 1000 for interfaith and pluralism matters and a 1000 plus on Islam. In addition Mike has conducted workshops on Atheist to Zoroastrian and every one in between.

WHO ARE MODERATES

They are sensitive to what's happening around them and take the necessary action, they are not stick-in-the-muds. They are willing to place America first, party next.

Moderates are usually silent, but do exercise their vote and keep the radicals out. They dumped Santorum, Pawlenty, Bachman, Gingrich, Cain, Rudy Guiliani, Alan West, Sara Palin and others.

A few names who have demonstrated moderation at times are; Chris Christie, Colin Powell, Arnold Schwartngegger, John Huntsman, Condi Rice, Mark Rubio, Jeb Bush, Bobby Jindal, John McCain - moderates are also characterized by self-criticism. No one know what Romney was.

'Radical' conservatives are characterized by jumping on any one who criticizes their party, they lack introspection, and are stuffed with me or you attitude, and rarely do they know what 'we' and 'us' means.

Moderate Republicans are distinguished by their ability to see a different point of view, and are the majority, a silent majority within the party. Its time for us to speak up before we get completely routed out.

Bush Penance

As Republicans we do not have the balls to face there realities of life, instead we curse and blame others. Bush lied to Americans to go to war with Iraq, We may blame Cheney, but the buck stops at the President. What was the cost?

01. Million Americans losing their Jobs

02. Businesses going out of business

03. Racks up 8 Trillion dollars in debt

04. Millions of home foreclosure

05. Thousands of business shut downs

06. Divorces

07. Death of 500,000 Iraqis for his lies

08. Death of 4, 486 Americans troops09. Thousands of women on the street

10. Add Afghanistan..

For what? We Republicans have to pay a prices from our silence when crimes against humanity were committed.

I hope some day he apologizes to Americans, Iraqis and Afghans. I don't understand how one can live with so much guilt and not seek forgiveness.